India's gross GST collection rises 12% to ₹14.97 lakh crore in April-December 2023

India's gross goods and services tax (GST) collection saw a substantial year-on-year growth of 12% during the April-December 2023 period, reaching ₹14.97 lakh crore, the Finance Ministry said on Monday (January 1).

This marks a notable increase from the ₹13.40 lakh crore collected in the corresponding period of the previous year (April-December 2022).

The monthly average gross GST collection of ₹1.66 lakh crore during the initial nine months of this year reflects a 12% upswing compared to the corresponding period in FY23, which had an average of ₹1.49 lakh crore.

The gross GST revenue collected in December 2023 is ₹1,64,882 crore, out of which CGST is ₹30,443 crore, SGST is ₹37,935 crore, IGST is ₹84,255 crore (including ₹41,534 crore collected on import of goods) and cess is ₹12,249 crore (including ₹1,079 crore collected on import of goods).

Notably, this marks the seventh month so far this year with collections exceeding ₹1.60 lakh crore.

The government has allocated ₹40,057 crore to CGST and ₹33,652 crore to SGST from IGST. Following the routine settlement, the total revenue for the Centre and the states in December 2023 stands at ₹70,501 crore for CGST and ₹71,587 crore for SGST.

December 2023 revenues exhibited a 10.3% increase compared to GST revenues in the same month last year. Revenues from domestic transactions, including the import of services, recorded a 13% rise during the month compared to the corresponding period last year.

Vivek Jalan, Partner, Tax Connect Advisory, said, "The GST collections have shown a surge of around 12% over last year which is certainly a robust growth. However, the efficiency of government tax machinery is calculated by the tax buoyancy generated.

Hence, to understand whether the GST machinery is outperforming the economy or not, tax buoyancy is one good measure. Considering an inflation of 5.5% and GDP growth of 6.5%, a growth in GST revenues by 12% just around matches the real economic growth. It means that there is NIL tax buoyancy as of now."